'87,000 IRS agents' is a zombie lie [View all]

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from WaPo:

‘87,000 IRS agents’ is the zombie falsehood setting the House agenda

“Our very first bill will repeal the funding for 87,000 new IRS agents.”
— House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), in remarks on the floor, Jan. 7

“THIS WEEK—The House Republican Majority will move to pass legislation to:
-Defund the 87,000 new IRS agents.”
— House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.), in a tweet, Jan. 8

Republicans took charge of the House of Representatives this week — and put forward as their first act a bill that is based on a repeatedly debunked falsehood.

We call these “zombie claims” because they keep rising from the dead no matter how often they have been fact-checked. But we haven’t before witnessed such a roundly criticized claim set the agenda for a new Congress. On Monday night, on a party-line vote of 221-210, the House approved a bill stripping $71 billion in funding from the Internal Revenue Service. (It has no chance of passage in the Senate, and President Biden has promised a veto.)

read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/01/10/87000-irs-agents-is-zombie-falsehood-setting-house-agenda/